Origin Opens Up To Mac Gamers with Alpha

EA’s Origin is meant to be a one-stop shop for gaming: so long as you have a Windows PC, you can shop for games and play them via the Origin platform. (Think Steam.) Origin overcame early skepticism (and a coupon debacle in which it inadvertently gave away free games) and is now expanding to the Mac platform. Only a few thousand U.S. and U.K. users will be able to download Origin for Mac initially.

For now, Mac support is in Alpha, and it’s incomplete. There is no store, for example, but the tab is there and Origin expects to make that live by the official launch. That’s true of certain other features, too, like Twitch. The same goes for the title catalog, which is limited at the moment. On the upside, if you’re one of the Alpa users, you’ll receive PopCap Bookwork free (check you My Games library) and you’ll be able to share your impressions with EA via a temporary Feedback button. You’ll need Mac OS X 10.6.8 and an Intel Core 2 Duo CPU or better to get going.